Lao PDR - Nam Ou river - Fish in bamboo containers for selling in the local market

Bamboo containers filled with fish by the Nam Ou river, Phongsaly province, Lao PDR. The fishermen will take them to the nearest village of Ban Tang to sell. The Nam Ou river connects small riverside villages and provides the rural population with food for fishing. But this river and others like it, that are the lifeline of rural communities and local economies are being blocked, diverted and decimated by dams. The Lao government hopes to transform the country into ‘the battery of Southeast Asia’ by exporting the power to Thailand and Vietnam.